My friend said to me “I understand intellectually that they do this for money and power. But I don’t get it get it.”
This is because it can’t be understood logically how Trump, Musk, the global oligarchs, the MAGA, Putin, the rulers of Iran or anyplace that denigrates women, or a dozen other malefactors do what they do.
In a world of forests, oceans, stars, and on occasion a sky so impossibly blue it breaks our hearts. A world teeming with eagles and hummingbirds, elephants and squirrels, whales and goldfish. oak trees and roses. Millions of species all clamoring for life.
On this, the only planet where we can eat an ice cream cone or hold a baby. The only place to enjoy that first sip of coffee on the porch under a rising sun. And we are just passing through. By the time we reach the end it seems almost like just a few short days.
But these guys—all they want to do is dismantle it. The usual story is that it’s for money and power. It doesn’t make sense because no amount of either of these things is worth the cost. And no amount is enough to satisfy these malefactors.
I believe it is born out of a profound spiritual sickness. How else could a person put children in cages or put families under bridges or carpet bomb cities under that impossible blue sky, with mother’s breastfeeding infants, people making dinner, and a guy just trying to put boxes on a shelf.
How could they cut down the Amazon Basin for hamburgers or drill the arctic? How could they keep drilling anything, knowing what we know now. Only a profoundly sick spirit could render this world into a hell with beautiful scenery.
The earth has troubles enough with out any of that. Fires, floods and tidal waves. Famine and pestilence. The natural response of the spiritually healthy human is to do as little harm as possible and to work on making the world better.
The spiritually sick, however, act as at least half our world leaders do. They care not if they make it worse. Or destroy things that are irreplaceable and precious. They just take and take. But it is never enough, for they are hungry ghosts—insatiable.
One of the only things we can do, in the face of something of this magnitude, and this unhinged, is to strengthen our own centers. Eat the ice cream. Look up at the night sky. Love your humans, your animal companions, and the land under your feet. And consider how to live lightly on the earth we share with an entire biosphere.
Beautifully and heartfully said.......I don't know how they can be so uncaring, either......Makes me sad for them and for our world......Fortunately there are still people like you and us who Do Still Care.......
Thank you! 💙